Love, Pain and the Whole Damn Thing
by theromangoddess
Summary: McGonagall and Harry deal with Dumbledore's death.


Love, Pain and the Whole Damn Thing…

Rated T

A/N: This fic takes place a few days after the death of Albus Dumbledore. This fic could be considered cannon excepting the fact that I refuse to write Dumbledore as gay. If Rowling had wanted to make a statement than she should have made his sexuality a factor in the books, not after the release of the last book. If ADMM makes you feel sick, then, for the love of god, do not read this fic!

Harry lay in bed, the covers weighing heavily on his tired limbs, his eyes wide, his hands restless. He couldn't sleep. It was well after midnight, and the hot summer night air was almost oppressive. The thunder rolled outside, a hot summer thundershower, pounding off in the distance, loud and foreboding as the beat of a timpani. Scrunching up his face, Harry pushed the covers away angrily, as he kicked the covers off his legs, jumping out of bed with a muttered 'Lumos'. Pulling on his invisibility cloak, and checking to make sure that Ron was still asleep in the four-poster next to his, Harry headed quickly out of the tower. His destination burning like a beacon in his mind, there was only one person he could talk to, one person he needed to talk to, then maybe he could sleep.

Rushing through the corridors, the hot early summer air nipping at his heels, Harry ignored everything. He had one destination in mind, one place he needed to be. He strode purposefully through the hall, the thunder a deep roll in the background, the castle seeming to shake with its force. Suddenly Harry stopped and stared, he had arrived.

Standing in front of the huge stone gargoyle Harry shouted 'Savory Slugs' before realizing the error of his ways as the gargoyle stood stock still, unmoving. Cursing under his breath, Harry began to rack his mind for another candy. Suddenly it hit him like a 10-pound weight, heavier and deeper than the bellow of the thunder, Dumbledore was dead, McGonagall was Headmistress. The password had changed.

"Of course she changed it!" Harry growled, "stupid, silly old bitty! She just couldn't wait for this office to be hers…already moved in. He's not even been dead a week!"

Angry tears began to form in Harry's eyes, and he pounded his fist into the hard, cold, stonewall. "Dammit, Dumbledore!" He swore loudly.

Suddenly, and without preamble, the gargoyle slid to the side.

Harry frowned, looking back and forth, that was curious.

The spiral stairway to the headmaster's office was dark, nary a light on the wall, and somewhere off in the distance, just under the rumble of the thunder, a piano could be heard playing softly, it's deep, dark, sad music permeating the air and rolling tangibly down the stairway.

Harry crept up onto the stairway, holding onto the railing. He had been on these stairs a hundred times, he'd been up here since Dumbledore's death, and yet, this time they seemed foreign, different, and Harry's breath caught in his throat, his chest constricting. He cursed himself for being such a baby, and yet he couldn't shake the feeling that he should have stayed in bed, that he shouldn't be here, shouldn't go to the office, that he was somehow intruding on Dumbledore's memory.

The stair came to a rest, and Harry stood before the huge oak door. The need to talk to Dumbledore overwhelmed him, shoving aside his sense of foreboding, his sense of propriety, and, as the thunder rolled in the distance and the music seeped from the floorboards, Harry pushed open the door.

As Harry opened the dark office, he gaped. Apparently he had been mistaken, for the office looked exactly as Dumbledore had left it. Fawkes' perch sat on the corner of the desk, long since abandoned. His instruments sat whizzing and whirling on the desk. His penseive was in its usual place, memories strewn around it. Harry's eyes scanned the room; the portraits hung snoozing in their frames. The only change to the room was the portrait of Dumbledore that hung just to the left of the desk.

Harry smiled slightly, tears coming to his eyes as he crossed the room. "Dumbledore" Harry muttered, above the rumble of the thunder and the melodious, wafting sonata. The portrait merely snored in response. "Professor" Harry tried again, reaching an imploring hand toward the frame…nothing, no reaction. "Professor Dumbledore!" Harry pleaded, "I need to speak with you."

The portrait of Dumbledore shrugged in his sleep, nestling deeper into his chair, Harry's eyes lit up, "Dumbledore," He said, hoping that the headmaster was awakening…he sighed as his plea was met solely with snores from Dumbledore, as he settled into an apparently deep sleep.

Harry turned and slid down the wall below Dumbledore's painting, dejected.

"Professor, I need to speak with you. I have so much yet to do, so much to do to stop Voldemort!" A loud clap of thunder sounded in the background, casting a funerary glow on the dark room. "I don't know how to find the Horcruxes without your help. I told Ron and Hermione, as you suggested, but I don't know how to destroy him. " The thunder rolled through the room, permeating the walls, and tears of frustration began to leak from Harry's eyes.

Harry leaned heavily against the wall, listening to the sounds of the night: the roll of thunder, the snoring of the headmasters…but, wait, he thought, his ears perking, what happened to the low din of the piano. He grimaced, he had assumed that somewhere, deep within the tower, a piano had been charmed to play while the portraits slept, it seemed like something Dumbledore would have wanted. He did so love chamber music.

Suddenly, without preamble, Harry heard the distinct creak of a door, and the sound of bare feet on the stairs above. Quickly, with nearly feline reflexes, Harry pulled his invisibility cloak up over his head.

Just as Harry had finished pulling on his cloak, a huge clap of thunder illuminated the night sky, casting an eerie glow on the room, and revealing the image of Professor McGonagall, slowly moving down the stairway, looking to all the world like a ghost against the night sky.

Harry was stunned. He had never seen McGonagall look so…unkempt…her hair fell in long waves down her back, her feet were bare and she wore a tattered old tartan dressing gown.

McGonagall walked carefully, nearly lethargically, through the room, placing her hand on the edge of the desk, McGonagall ran her hand lightly over the surface, a nearly wistful expression on her face, before collapsing into her chair. As she sat, two candles on the desk, sprung to life, their light flickering slightly and adding a warm glow to the dark room.

Harry had known McGonagall for many years, but he had never seen her as he saw her now, for the first time that night, he really did feel as if he were intruding. As she leaned back in her chair, her hair fell almost to the floor. Her dressing gown had gaped open at the neck, and Harry could see a light cotton nightshirt with light blue shooting stars on it peeking out from underneath. If Harry had not known better, he would have thought that the shirt was one that he had seen on Dumbledore during one of his late night excursions.

The thunder rolled loudly in the background, making itself known, and McGonagall sighed, running her hand through her long dark, graying hair, before leaning back heavily in her chair.

"Fancy seeing you here, Professor McGonagall." A deep voice stated quietly from somewhere above Harry's head. Neither Harry nor McGonagall needed to turn to know whom the voice belonged to. Harry frowned…Dumbledore had not been willing to talk to him, when he needed him, why was he talking to McGonagall?

"I thought you were asleep." McGonagall said, staring forward.

"I was, but, my dear, the scent of you roused me from my sleep, ginger and heather, a wonderful combination."

McGonagall smiled slightly, still staring straight ahead. "I couldn't sleep."

She confided quietly.

"I know," he said, a sad, wistful smile crossing his face, "I heard the piano. What was it tonight? Bach followed by a little Mozart?" Minerva nodded slightly in acquiescence. "It was beautiful." Dumbledore stated in an awed voice.

Harry gaped, so it was McGonagall who was playing. How had he never known that she was a musician?

"My dear," He said, in a low, rumbling voice that could barely be heard above the thunder, "I must admit, you look tantalizing in my nightshirt."

"I knew it!" Harry very nearly said out loud.

McGonagall smiled, turning to Dumbledore for the first time that night. "I find it difficult to sleep without you." McGonagall said in an equally deep, low voice.

Harry felt his heart stop. His knuckles turned white. He felt as if he had been hit by a bludger. This couldn't be. He would have known. He would have known… wouldn't he?

"Damn, the confines of this frame!" Dumbledore groaned.

McGonagall, smiled slightly, standing, and gliding around the desk, her grace and poise revealing her breeding. Standing in front of his picture, McGonagall ran a tender, loving hand along the edge of the frame. The thunder clapped loudly in the background, and the lightning flashed, illuminating the headmaster and his mistress. "I do so miss you." McGonagall sighed.

"I know, love." Dumbledore sighed, mirroring her movements and running his own hand along the opposite side of his portrait. Harry groaned inwardly, he should have listened to his intuition, he really was interrupting, something he had never hoped to see, never even thought of. "I love you, Minerva." Dumbledore said, gazing into her eyes. "I always have and I always will."

"I've never once doubted it," McGonagall said with a gleam in her eye. "I've loved you all my life. We'll get through this…I'll get through this…we have to. Even death can't separate us….we're one…remember?" He nodded, a smile breaking out on his face. "Bound for all eternity."

"Greatest day of my life," Dumbledore said with a grin.

"You know it," McGonagall said with a wink. "Now, if only I could have gotten the governors to agree to put your portrait in the bedroom…"

"Minerva!" Dumbledore exclaimed, feigning shock.

"Albus!" McGonagall exclaimed, mocking him. Running her hand over the painted features of his face, McGonagall's face turned sad, as if a storm cloud had rolled over her, "I should try to get some sleep." She turned…and then, a rather weak wicked gleam shone in her eyes, "after all, I do have a school to run…"

Dumbledore smiled, rolling his eyes. "Sleep well, my love."

A phantom breeze blew out the candles; the room was shrouded in darkness. The thunder rolling in the distance, the oppressive mist of the summer night, the snoring of the headmasters, the distinct creaking of a door as McGonagall retired to bed.

The night wrapped like a blanket around Harry. Suddenly a deep voice permeated the air, so low that it was almost unintelligible, "O and Harry, don't tell anyone what you saw here tonight." Before Harry even had time to respond, Dumbledore's snoring joined the others'.


End file.
